Grammys on the Hill…

Grammys on the Hill…

HollywoodOn Productions: Janet Donovan & Brendan Kownacki
Photo credit: Brendan Kownacki

“It’s amazing to see how one song can unite the world,” Panamanian singer-songwriter sensation Erika Ender told Hollywood on the Potomac at the Recording Academy™  20 years of advocacy in Washington, DC and the annual Grammys on the Hill celebration at The Hamilton.

“When I work I try always to put the best of me in each song,” she added. “Despacito became the soundtrack of the world, so it’s a blessing. I’m super grateful to be part of this dream team. I’m super happy that we got, you know, the whole world to listen to a song in Spanish. And I’m super grateful to Bieber as well who decided to sing his version mostly in Spanish. So I’m just grateful, and happy, and I really hope that this opens doors for new people and new generations and new music. It doesn’t matter the language, because we broke barriers. We broke records, and we showed the world that today we have the music right here in the palm of our hands. And what’s important is doing great things so you know that we can cross-over and touch as many people as possible.”

Erika Ender

Lisa Loeb  is an American singer-songwriter, producer, touring artist, actress, author, and philanthropist who started her career with the platinum-selling number 1 hit song, “Stay (I Missed You)” from the film Reality Bites, the first number 1 single for an artist without a recording contract.  She is a recent Grammy winner although she was also nominated about 20 years ago for other music.  “I’m here because I’m standing with a bunch of other music makers, creative people, producers, song writers, artists, to really try to spread the message about the new legislation that we would like to get passed, The Music Modernization Act,” she told us. ” We feel like the creators should have proper compensation for what they’re doing and because, you know, we all get music in different ways than we use to. We listen to it digitally. When I was a kid we bought albums, vinyl, and then CD’s and cassette tapes. Now people get their music in a different way and so it’s really important for the business side of things to reflect that.”

Lisa Loeb

“So, I have a record called Feel What You Feel that won the Grammy this year for best Children’s record,” she added. “It’s really a family friendly record and I feel like it’s an important record right now because the lyrics reflect something I feel we all need in our country right now – they’re songs about respect, about acknowledging others, about acknowledging your own feelings so that you can make a change if you want to. I’ve been making family records for about 15 years now, way before I was married or had children. And it was inspired by my love of the entertainment I engaged in the 70s and 80s. There was a lot of grown up entertainment like the Muppets or Steve Martin, The Tonight Show, Donnie and Marie, all these great shows that I loved as a kid and they told great stories – sometimes it was silly, sometimes it was heartwarming. Always produced in a way that was for top notch production and I wanted to do that for kids. Now I also keep in mind what messages might my kids learn from in addition to doing all those other things.”

Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA) and Rep. Judy Chu

“The bill (The Music Modernization Act) is something we’ve worked on over the last four years,” Rep. Collins told Hollywood on the Potomac. “It’s a bill that we sponsored. It started off as the Songwriter Equity Act and then it just built into the Music Modernization Act and it’s been a lot of work. Judy’s been a great help in that, and we’ve now got it through the committee – looking forward to getting it to the House floor. It’s just something that, at the end of the day, is about fairness, it’s about making this industry better and having the ecosystem with songwriters and artists and everybody coming together to be able to, in the new world and the environment of the Digital Age, have a way to get paid but also to have the services have access to the music so people can hear it. It is exciting to see. Judy and I have worked on for a long time.”

Rep. Chu  (D- CA)

“Well, it is so encouraging to see this bill get so far and really it looks like it will move through the different steps that it needs to,” said Rep. Chu. “There were people that never thought this could happen. But actually, this bill incorporates different things that makes the system so much fairer, including payment to artists who had hits pre-1972, who could not get any compensation for its play on the digital platform. So, finally they get it.”

So maybe Dionne Warwick and all the other artists can get something for their past hits!

Little Big Town

The evening honored Karen Fairchild, Kimberly Schlapman, Phillip Sweet, and Jimi Westbrook of three-time GRAMMY® winners Little Big Town.  Little Big Town’s contributions to the music industry align with some of the Recording Academy’s key advocacy and organizational causes, including advocating for music education and supporting MusiCares®, a charity founded by the Academy that provides a safety net of support for the music community. The evening also features a performance by the band. Uniting the worlds of music and politics, GRAMMYs on the Hill also recognized legislators who have improved the environment for music by advocating for music creators’ rights. The 2018 congressional honorees were Rep. Judy Chu (D-Calif.), a long-time champion of music creators, and Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.), author of the songwriter-focused Music Modernization Act (H.R. 4706) and a senior member of the House Judiciary Committee. Chu and Collins also both serve as co-chairs of the Congressional Creative Rights Caucus.

“Music is healing and powerful, and music education gives our children an outlet for expression that is absolutely necessary for their overall growth and well-being,” said Fairchild. “We will continue to do our part to protect music education, songwriters, recordings, and the artists who bring them to life.”

On with the show:

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